Dettol partners with Nairobi County in commemorating the Global Handwashing Day

Dettol, RB’s flagship brand has today teamed with Nairobi County to continuously drive the handwashing campaign among pupils in public primary schools across the county.

Dettol East Africa Head of Marketing Damira Golubic gives children tips on hand washing

The announcement was made earlier on today during the commemoration of the Global Handwashing Day held at Gituamba Primary School in Embakasi County. The Handwashing Day is celebrated globally on October 15th. The day is marked by worldwide celebrations, events, and advocacy campaigns on hand washing.

This year’s Global Handwashing Day theme, “Clean Hands – a recipe for health,” emphasizes the linkages between handwashing and food.

In 2017, more than 500 million people promoted the simple, life-saving act of handwashing with soap on Global Handwashing Day. The day was founded by the Global Handwashing Partnership in 2008 to help communities, advocates, and leaders spread the word about handwashing with soap.

It is estimated that up to 800,000 children globally die annually due to diarrhea – a preventable disease occasioned by poor hand hygiene practices such as lack of hand washing with soap. In Kenya, a 2017 study by the International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health reveals that diarrhea is the fourth most common illness seen in health facilities in Kenya and accounts for one in five of all hospital admissions. It is the fourth overall most common cause of death among children under five years of age in Kenya, with a case fatality of up to 21%.

The study further notes that hygiene interventions including hygiene education and promotion of hand washing can reduce diarrhea cases in Kenya by up to 45 per cent.

Speaking during the event, RB’s Head of Marketing, Damira Golubic noted that the Global Handwashing Day raises awareness of the importance of handwashing and encourages action to promote and sustain handwashing habits.

On his part, the Kasarani Sub County Public Health Officer, John Ukah said that “By partnering with private sector players, we are moving closer to protecting the lives of the residents of Nairobi County. Without a doubt this partnership will play an important role in creating a healthier county.”

In Kenya, Dettol has reached over 2 million mothers in both the government and private health sector, teaching them these basic hygiene habits and sampling soap to them. Additionally, over the last few years, Dettol taught over 3 million of school children on basic hygiene across the country. Dettol has over the years focused its investment in school hygiene programs, targeting children in both urban and rural areas.

Globally, Dettol implements a new mums program that has touched over 8 million new mothers around the world with hygiene education. In order to implement this, the brand works with a variety of partners from charities and NGO’s to health care professionals such as paediatricians and midwives and various governmental organizations in over 40 countries around the world to reach new moms and inform them on basic yet powerful healthy hygiene habits to protect the health, not only of their new arrival, but their whole family.